Last year, Brian Minor told me that he would register for the "Double G", the Saturday 5K named for Barbara Galloway, and the Sunday half-marathon organized by Jeff Galloway. As I've always enjoyed the half-marathon - and the registration fee for the next year is half-price in the days following each year's races, I decided to join Brian and registered for both races in the Galloway weekend. In the past I've resisted, largely because I've believed that running a 5K on Saturday is a good recipe for a bad half-marathon on Sunday. But I resolved to run the 5K conservatively, simply as a shakeout run.
Rain began Friday evening and continued throughout the night, and during my drive to Ansley Mall in midtown Atlanta, where we gathered at the Phiddippides store before the race. But fortunately the rain diminished to a light drizzle as the 8 am starting time for the race approached. Brian and I made our way to the start, about a half-mile south of the store, which was a perfect warmup jog. I looked around at the small group gathering for the start, and said to Brian "I might have a chance for an age group award: not too many old guys here today!"
Before the race began, the National Anthem was sung and I dutifully removed my cap. Until then, my head was dry, but I could feel my hair getting soaked with the drizzle. The singer delivered the anthem at a patriotic, majestic, slow tempo, holding the high note ..... drawing out the last stanza, not wanting to end the anthem. Finally I put my cap back on, now that I was evenly wet, in 39 deg F temperatures.
A line of about a dozen runners gathered at the start line, including Brian. There was a big gap between them and the second line. We were waiting for more fast runners to fill the space! As Barb Galloway counted down to the start, with about 5 seconds to go I began walking toward the start line. Immediately upon hearing the starting command, I began running, crossing the start line with no more than a second delay.
And I kept running, fast, fast, fast. Attaboy Frank, way to throw away the conservative race plan in the first five seconds of the race! But, I felt really good! Fast, fast, fast, and then downhill on Winchester Drive, across Piedmont Road and then more steeply downhill, even faster! The road seemed a little slick with leaves pasted to the asphalt, so I was careful, but kept going fast, fast, fast. At the bottom of the hill I finally slowed a little, to avoid wiping out on the sharp right turn into Piedmont Park.
Having safely negotiated the turn, I just kept running. My Garmin data showed a sub-7 minute pace for much of that initial sprint. At 3:30, my watch sounded, and so I took the first 30 second walk break. At least I stuck to that part of the plan. Normally I would feel silly taking a walk break in a 5K, but in a Galloway race, that was 100% appropriate. When my watch sounded again, I sprinted ahead of the people that had just passed me. Then a little boy passed me at incredible speed! But 100 feet ahead of me, he slowed to a walk, panting heavily, weaving in the walkway. I passed him on his left, barely staying on the path, but avoiding contact as I passed. I may have outweighed him by more than 100 pounds: it would have been criminally bad if I had collided with him.
The second walk break coincided with a water station and the 1 mile marker, so I took a cup of water as the watch recorded 7:46 for mile 1, 67 feet net downhill. Continuing through the park, we now ran over some gentle rollers. At the south end of the park, we turned onto the same path that we had taken late in mile 4 of last Saturday's Eastside Beltline 10K. I expected to see a big puddle at a dip in the path that would force us onto the muddy grass. Today, the puddle did not extend across the path. Unfortunately, a maintenance truck was very slowly moving in the opposite direction. That truck threatened to drive onto the dry half of the path: don't you dare! I stared down the truck and stood my ground on the dry side of the path. Potential collision #2 avoided.
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| No wonder I ran so fast at the start! |
In mile 2 I had slowed to 8:38, 16:24 elapsed, but I believe that I would have slowed more if I hadn't taken the walk breaks. I ran a sub-8 minute pace for most of the second half of mile 2, 32 feet net uphill. Now to the finish! As one of the few runners using run-walk, I leapfrogged runners with every run interval, then a few people would pass while I walked. But overall I gained ground on more runners than I lost. I took a walk break at 19:30, resumed running at 20:00 even, but calculated that I would finish in more than 25 minutes. Around 23:10 elapsed, I decided to take a short walk break, then when the walk signal sounded at 23:30, I resumed sprinting, for what turned out to be 100 seconds. My watch recorded 8:11 for mile 3, 24:35 elapsed, 20 feet net downhill. In the final 0.11 mile, I passed two runners but couldn't catch up with a couple of others who had moved ahead of me earlier in the race. But I wasn't really racing, right?! I saw Bonnie just past the finish line as I crossed in 25:12, running a 7:03 pace for the last 0.11 miles, 19 feet net downhill. Overall the Garmin data recorded that the race route was 75 net downhill!
I saw the preliminary results on Sunday: Brian finished in 23:49, 8th out of 282 finishers (6th male), and I finished 18th, 16th male. I was third in my age group, and wasn't surprised as I thought that there were a couple of older guys immediately in front of me. This was a fun experience, even with the drizzle and cold. I took care to cool down with an easy jog to the store, and stretched immediately afterwards, and throughout the afternoon and evening. I didn't feel any ill effects from the race. Despite a lot of excitement in the evening - Atlanta United won the Major League Soccer Championship Game - I slept really well that night!
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